Introduction
I was caught completely off-guard at the depth of the consternation and disbelief expressed by quite a few readers who responded to the estimates that I had provided of the amount of money Guyana loses due to three corrupt practices (public procurement fraud; illicit capital flight; and the underground economy) in last week’s column ($313billion or about US$1.5billion). To recall, that column had provided estimates of the orders of magnitude of the economic haemorrhage Guyana is presently suffering due to corruption in three economic areas: procurement fraud ($28-35billion or about US$140million); illicit capital flight($90billion or about US$450million); and, the underground economy($188billion or about US$940million).
I had expected that, on the eve of the momentous national and regional elections of May 11 2015, little if any